M25 ALT

ALT – the Association of Learning Technologists have a regional meet-up every three months or so usually somewhere in London. It’s a friendly, open and welcoming bunch of folk and there’s usually something of interest on the agenda.

So on Wednesday I made my way from Tooting up to QML and the People’s Palace for a pleasant lunch and afternoon of talks and activities. You can get a feel for the event from Leo’s storify here: https://storify.com/leohavemann/m25-learning-technology-group-spring-2016-literaci

It was a packed afternoon and I demonstrated my inability to remember names on a regular basis, but here are just a couple of things that I particularly liked.

Digital literacies and capabilities have been on the agenda for some time and we still don’t seem to have got very far with them as David Andrew reflected – interesting to see if the new JISC framework helps at all.

There was an interesting exercise with cardboard boxes, pens and stickers – based on an event UCL ran to get students to think creatively about their digital journey / dream learning environment and experiences.

I drew this as my digital dream:

My reason for creating a cassette recorder (apart from owning several)  is that old-school analogue cassette recorders were so easy to use that there was almost no barrier to using them. Ok, the tapes chewed sometimes and the heads needed cleaning, but almost anyone could use them. (Pedants may wish to know that the eject button is round the side).

Am I saying digital technology is harder to use? Well, often it seems it is with confusing interfaces or technical glitches that get between the user and the learning.

It was good to hear (and meet) Richard Treves who spoke about getting staff and students to create their own screencasts . At the end of it I was convinced I should look at using Office mix to create simple screencasts. More here: http://www.richardtreves.com/recording-a-presentation-using-powerpoint-mix/

Unfortunately it doesn’t work on a Mac, thank you Microsoft. I’ll have to stick to Camtasia for now.

There was naturally a trip to a very nice pub where the chat was just as interesting: The Victoria

Many thanks to the organisers.

 

March MUGGL

On Wednesday I attended the MUGGL (Moodle User Group Greater London) meeting at Queen Mary University, it was my first MUGGL in a while and I was really impressed with the huge turnout. A big thank you to the organisers, presenters and to Queen Mary for hosting.

 

The Grade II listed stone clock tower at Queen Mary, University of London

 

The theme this time was improving users vs improving design and the first session focussed on approaches to training and support with presentations from SOAS, LSE and Roehampton. This was a really useful section as we have been looking for new ways to deliver training to both staff and students. We currently offer an open door policy where students and staff can drop-in to see us in the library but we hope to start running more structured training sessions soon too. Suggestions included:

• Group sessions throughout the year
• Short refresher training sessions
• Online learning
• Drop-in lunchtime sessions

The idea behind running training sessions is to show both students and staff what Moodle is capable of and as a result create an engaging Moodle page which may contribute towards improved learning outcomes.

If you have any suggestions about how we could deliver training add a comment below!

The second section looked at usability and making Moodle look more attractive; another aspect of Moodle we are looking to improve! There were presentations from UAL, City, CASS Business School, Floream and CIPD showing some great ideas and examples of attractive, user friendly Moodle pages. We are currently working to improve our Moodle and have been looking at a new theme which we hope everyone will agree is a step in the right direction. Those with access to St George’s Moodle may have noticed the new theme being used on our new Study+ page.

 

Study+ using the ‘Clean’ theme